I don't really know.....personally, I tend to stay with authors I have already read unless I see a review that interests me. I try not to waste time with froth unless I am tired or worried enough that I am unable to fully engage brain.
I have come across some worthwhile freebies here, as well as by random poking at the kindle store, but I feel a more directed approach would have benefits.

I will often look to Gutenberg for the classics, as well as Manybooks and of course here on the forum. What I get I often won't read immediately, just stick it in the library for later perusal.

I find that I tend to come across new books most often when I'm looking for them.

But seriously... I just read. Part of what makes it so easy for me, is that I have no self-imposed rules about trying to select books that I'm already fairly certain I'm going to adore before I even read a single page. That would make me a complacent reader. I would miss out on many kinds of books I just wasn't aware I enjoyed until after I'd read them. That happens to me a lot.

Personally, I work under the assumption that "what I like" is still very much a work in progress. It's certainly not carved in stone, by any means. And as such, I don't consider it a failure on my part to have chosen a book at random that it turned out I didn't like. I just stop reading it and move on if it becomes too much of a chore for me. No sweat.

So the answer to the question, for me, is simple. I find new books I love to read by reading scads of books which I have no clue before-hand whether or not I might enjoy them.

I tend to be a little bit like you in a way I seem to get on an author and tend to read everything they have ever written. Although these days I seem to be more varied. I have David Weber open, John Ringo and Eric Flint open. I really should go polish off David Weber before I move on, I finished his Honor Harringtion series and I was thinking about the March UpCounty. I really should finish one author before I open another.

Go to biggest bookstore around, spend hours. This is what I do at least once a month. Same thing for English book (which I can only find as e-books); go to B&N site, spend hours browsing and reading samples.

I believe you should find new books hard way. Not by reading reviews and such. But still I do read reviews too. Only from these sites:

Recommendations from other readers are my best leads. I find books from "Best of...." lists, award nominations, bestseller lists, reviews, bookclub suggestions, recommendations from "What are you reading" threads on various forums, editors picks on Audible, librarian picks on the library site.

Wynd the troubble is not you the troubble is the authors that you are reading books from. At the moment I have a limit of what I will pay for any book, good or bad makes little difference and its $6. Thats way below going rate these days, I know. It's just that I can get that and you can to its means that you will need to be selective about the publishers that you buy from. The publishers I will buy from these days are Gold Eagle (A business unit of Harlaquine - for more infromation go to mackbolan.com) and Baen. You are simply reading books from high cost publishers, which is something I refuse to do.

Friends recommendations, especially when it's people who have a similar taste to mine or who know me (and my absolute no-nos) well enough to rec stuff they think I might like. If it sounds interesting enough, I'll give it a go.

GoodReads recommendations have also started to offer up some interesting options now that I have added and rated ~200 books in there.

Amazon forums, especially genre forums for those genres I am interested in, is a good way to find out about books in general - not necessarily recommendations, but a way to learn about authors/titles that other people are reading and then check out the books and blurbs to see if it might be anything for me.

Amazon's "other people who bought X also bought Y" and "based on your browsing history" work the same way, i.e. letting me know what else is out there to take a closer look at.

The various "what are you reading now?" threads in various forums I frequent - also more for awareness of books out there than specific recs, but it works well enough.

Browsing in physical bookshops stopped being of use to me years ago, unfortunately, but all the above methods have replaced browsing in bookshops well enough.

Let's have a discussion of how to find new books we will love to read. What's the most effective way to find new books?

I have my read-everything-authors, browse through my Amazon recommendations, check out forums... No magic bullet though, I end reading lots of okayish books before finding something I really like. I might find perhaps 3 new authors I really like each year: Latest hits: Sharpe Series (2012), Hunger Games (June 2011), The Warded Man (December 2010)

BTW Amazon recommendations have lost a lot of their usefuleness for me as Amazon keeps separate lists for paper books and e-books. It recomends e-books I already bought on paper and the other way round.

Last edited by ametzler; 04-10-2012 at 02:06 PM.
Reason: was not complete.

I find that I tend to come across new books most often when I'm looking for them.

But seriously... I just read. Part of what makes it so easy for me, is that I have no self-imposed rules about trying to select books that I'm already fairly certain I'm going to adore before I even read a single page. That would make me a complacent reader. I would miss out on many kinds of books I just wasn't aware I enjoyed until after I'd read them. That happens to me a lot.Personally, I work under the assumption that "what I like" is still very much a work in progress. It's certainly not carved in stone, by any means. And as such, I don't consider it a failure on my part to have chosen a book at random that it turned out I didn't like. I just stop reading it and move on if it becomes too much of a chore for me. No sweat.
So the answer to the question, for me, is simple. I find new books I love to read by reading scads of books which I have no clue before-hand whether or not I might enjoy them.

The idea with the above is that you put in the name of an author you like, it it will give you others that are allegedly similar. Another one in this ballpark, but IMHO not as good, is similarauthors.com.

The problem I find with this kind of site is that without knowing why I typed in an author, they don't have a clue what to return. For example, say someone puts in Faye Kellerman. I could be looking for:

-- Novels with an Orthodox Jewish setting

-- Novels set in Los Angeles

-- Police procedurals

-- Long ongoing series that started being published in recent decades

-- Husband/wife mystery series

-- Bestsellers with traditional values

-- Novels about adopted people

-- A long series of novels where every book is available as an OverDrive eBook

etc., etc., etc. And most of the above does not seem to be a consideration in who they recommend.